Program

The fifth conference of the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness will bring together researchers from numerous disciplines to discuss these issues through an intensive series of workshops, plenary lectures, symposia, paper presentations and poster contributions extending over four days between May 27-May 30, 2001. The meeting will take place in Durham, North Carolina - USA, on the campus of Duke University.

DELUCA,
John W. & DALY, Ray -Mind Stuff SM, Livonia, MI and Wayne State
University School of Medicine Neurobiofeedback Wellness Centre and
University of Windsor: TRANSFORMATION OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN BUDDHIST
TANTRIC MEDITATION

DEMPSEY,
Liam P. -Department of Philosophy University of Western Ontario:
MIND-BODY IDENTITY: TONIC FOR THE EPIPHENOMIC

SEGAL,
Eliaz -Department of Psychology The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
MEMORY AND THE FLOW OF TIME

SHANON,
Benny -Department of Psychology The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
ALTERED TEMPORALITY

SUNDQVIST,
Fredrik -University of Göteborg, Sweden GESTALT THEORY AND THE CONTENT
OF CONSCIOUSNESS

VAKALOPOULOS,
Costa -MBBS. A SCIENTIFIC PARADIGM FOR CONSCIOUSNESS

WALLER,
Sara -California State University

We
also have worshops on May 27th. YOU MAY ONLY REGISTER FOR A MAXIMUM
OF TWO WORKSHOPS (one in the morning and one in the afternoon).
Please make sure that there aren't any schedule conflicts in your
registration.

WORKSHOP
DESCRIPTIONS:

1-
Memes (AFTERNOON)

Susan
Blackmore, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK

The aim
of this workshop is to provide an introduction to the theory of
memetics and explore its relevance to the nature and contents of
consciousness. By the end of the workshop participants should (a)
understand what is, and is not, a meme, and how memetics can be
applied in several different fields (b) be familiar with the major
controversies and disagreements within memetics (c) have an informed
opinion on whether or not memetics is useful for the understanding
of human, animal and machine consciousness.

There
will be three sections, each including approximately half an hour's
lecture, interspersed with group and individual exercises, and with
plenty of time for discussion. Before the conference I will make
available on-line (at www.memes.org.uk) information on the workshop
and suggested readings, but prior preparation will not be assumed.
A handout will be provided.

Part
1. Introduction to memetics.

The term
'meme', coined by Dawkins in 1976 to mean a unit of imitation or
a cultural replicator. Natural selection, the theory of universal
Darwinism and the roles of replicators and vehicles (Hull's alternative
scheme, objections to the meme as replicator).

Selfish
memes: computer and email viruses, religions as viruses, co-adapted
meme-complexes and how they form.

An
imitation exercise - exploring why imitation is so difficult.
Levels of imitation.

Part
2. Memes and Consciousness.

Human
consciousness. Memes and human evolution. Memetic drive, the origins
of the big brain and language. How memetics changes conventional
views on the evolution of consciousness. Memes and their copying
machinery co-evolve. Humans as meme machines. Examples of memetic
engineering.

Dennett
- "Human consciousness itself is a huge complex of memes". Blackmore
- memes as distorting human consciousness. Is there consciousness
without memes? Implications of these two views for the contents
of consciousness. Their different predictions.

An
exercise. Are these ideas testable? A group exercise and discussion
of research potential.

Animal
consciousness. The debate over whether other animals have memes
(Laland and Dugatkin say yes, Blackmore no). The importance of imitation,
examples; apes and sign language, birds and milk bottles, cetaceans
and the imitation of sounds. Light shed on the relationship between
language and consciousness?

Machine
consciousness. Do machines have memes? Copying in artificial intelligent
systems. The internet as a meme machine. Memeplexes and distributed
consciousness.

Part
3. The self and self-transformation.

The theory
of self as memeplex. The idea of dismantling the memeplex. Meditation
and mindfulness as 'meme-weeding' techniques.

An
exercise in mindfulness. An opportunity for people to try some
short meditation exercises directed specifically at investigating
the power of memes in awareness.

Practical
and personal implications of a memetic theory of consciousness.
Free will, morality, legal responsibility (criticisms by Mary Midgley
and others). Dawkins's rebellion against the selfish replicators.
Who rebels?

2-
Current Investigations of Synaesthesia: When a 4 Just Has to be
Blue (SCHEDULE CHANGE: NOW MORNING)

For people
with synaesthesia ordinary stimuli elicit extraordinary conscious
experiences. For example, when C, a digit-colour synaesthete, views
ordinary black digits, each digit elicits a photism - a conscious
experience of a highly specific colour. In this workshop we will
discuss current behavioral investigations of synaesthesia. The general
approach of these investigations of synaesthesia has been to test
predictions based on synaesthetes' first-person descriptions of
their unusual qualia. Behavioural investigations of synaesthesia
provide two critical contributions to the study of synaesthesia.
First, these investigations provide a common forum for describing
synaesthesia. These investigations employ a scientifically agreed
upon common language to precisely define key concepts used to describe
synaesthetic experiences. Second, these investigations lead to a
better understanding of the cognitive mechanisms underlying synaesthetic
experiences. In this workshop we will discuss the empirical investigations
pertaining to the following issues regarding synaesthetic experiences:

a) The
consistency of synaesthetic experiences

b) The
automaticity of synaesthetic experiences

c) The
intimate relationship between synaesthetic photisms and meaning.

d) The
influence of synaesthetic experiences on digit perception.

e) The
relationship between synaesthetic experiences and memory. These
investigations of synaesthesia bring to the forefront a number of
critical issues pertaining to the study of consciousness.

These
issues include the following: a) The use of third-person behavioral
methods for investigating conscious experiences b) The relationship
between first-person and third-person methodologies in the study
of conscious experiences c) The implications that current investigations
of synaesthesia have on the binding problem.

3-Abnormalities
in the contents of consciousness: The case of schizophrenia (MORNING)

I shall
describe and contrast disorders in the contents of consciousness
(see list below) and argue that the disorders associated with schizophrenia
are distinct in that they involve mis-attributions of agency.

b: Disorders
of awareness of motor control Delusions of control (schizophrenia)
Phantom limbs Anarchic hand anosognosia

2:
Awareness in the control of action

I shall
discuss internal representations in the motor control system and
link these to certain disorders of the contents of consciousness.
I shall consider the physiological basis of internal representations
in the motor system.

a: Representations
in the motor control system

b: What
are we aware of in the motor control system?

c: A
framework for understanding abnormal awareness of motor control

d: Brain
systems

3: The
self and others I shall consider the problem of the perception of
agency in schizophrenia.

Does
the perception of agency derive from internal representations of
the self? What is the biological basis of the perception of agency?

Philosophical
issues, including topics of consciousness, are now routinely addressed
employing functional neuroimaging. Techniques now widely available
including functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and Positron
Emission Tomography (PET) are providing fundamental answers to questions
relating to consciousness. However, reliance on these techniques
is problematic as the data provided by such methods reveals only
correlation information, which is further complicated by the indirect
measure of neuronal activity via blood oxygenation and the reliance
on control tasks. Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS)
provides a non- invasive method for establishing causal and necessary
components within cortical networks. When combined with traditional
functional methods such as fMRI and PET, questions as to the direct
nature of cognition and consciousness can be addressed. The use
of this technique is not limited, and the adaptation of rTMS employing
numerous methodologies allows for a flexible and specific test of
cognitive hypotheses. A description of the cortical process of self-
awareness is far from complete, though networks for cognitive processes
that are related (e.g., Theory of Mind) are beginning to be elucidated.
The integration of rTMS with traditional neuroimaging methods addressing
the cortical correlates of self-awareness provides a background
in which researchers interested in consciousness may develop an
understanding of rTMS. This workshop will therefore provide an introduction
into the methodologies of rTMS within the context of examining higher-
order cognitive processes with a specific emphasis on self- directed
awareness. The topics as follows:

I
Introduction to rTMS

A Why
do we need TMS?

B Basic
Principles of Magnetic Stimulation

C Early
Historical Attempts: 19th and 20th Century D Successful Single-
Pulse TMS and the advent of rTMS

II
Four Relevant Methodologies

A Virtual
Lesions

B Cooling
and Heating

C Measures
of Cortical Excitability

D Paired
Pulse Measures of Inhibition and Excitation

BREAK

III
Integration of Functional Techniques

A Why
do we need TMS, Part II?

IV
Applications of rTMS in Higher- Order Cognition

A Language
& Vision

B Imagery
& Memory

C Self
& Consciousness

5-
Living without touch and proprioception: from phenomenology to PET.
(SCHEDULE
CHANGE: NOW AFTERNOON)

The workshop
will consider work from a single case study, of IW, who, over 25
years ago lost all sensation of touch and movement/joint position
sense below the neck. This was due to an infection leading to an
autoimmune neuronopathy affecting the sensory nerve cell bodies
in the dorsal rot ganglia.

In the
absence of large myelinated sensory nerve fibre function IW was
completely unable to move, not because the movement nerves were
affected, (they were not), but because without peripheral feedback
his central motor apparatus was disabled. IW spent nearly 5 months
requiring full nursing care before realising that if he looked at
the moving part and willed movement cognitively he could learnt
to make co-ordinated movements once more. He then spent 17 months
as an in-patient in a rehabilitation hospital spending all his waking
hours learning how to will movement again. He would spend 20 minutes
putting on a sock, feed himself cold food rather than be fed. After
round 12 months he stood and then several months later he walked.

Once
released from hospital he found a job as a civil servant and for
12 years did not see a doctor, telling colleagues that he had a
bad back to explain his unusual gait. He now works as a disability
access audit consultant advising banks, hospitals etc how to make
their built environment accessible for people with special needs
of various sorts, (locomotor difficulties, visual impairment etc).

The workshop
will be divided into several sessions:

1.
The phenomenology/narrative history.

This
will detail the sensory loss and its consequences for movement.
When unable to move his body he felt most disembodied. But once
able to move any such feelings retreated. He has never had true
phantom experiencing arguing that small fibre sensory input, (pain,
temperature, muscle fatigue) are sufficient to prevent the emergence
of such 'deafferentation' phenomena. It will follow his time in
rehabilitation, looking in detail at how he managed to recover movements
through cognitive control and visual supervenience. This will follow
IW's time in hospital and the ways in which the medical and paramedical
workers assisted him, or not, in him exploring new ways of looking
at movement. In addition to the obvious losses of mobility and sensation
the account will also consider the effects on IW of his loss at
a more personal level. For instance at one time he had recovered
locomotor and instrumental action but was bereft of gesture. He
therefore taught himself to gesture consciously to convince people
that his affective emotional use of movement was non-conscious and
'normal.' Data will be given suggesting that IW may have accessed
new or pre-existing central motor programs to allow some movements
to be automatic and that gesture, now, 25 years later, may be the
most automatic of all.

2.
The physiology of deafferentation.

Details
of neurophysiological experiments will be given looking at the evidence
for IW's complete loss of large sensory fibres. Further work will
look at the experimental evidence for his compensatory mechanisms
in terms of possible plastic change in the brain and for his use
of amazingly sophisticated cognitive strategies to facilitate movements.
This part will give the results of a wide variety of experiments
on IW's motor abilities:

1. his
ability to perceive weight, (considering the central perception
of force).

2. his
attentional abilities,

3. his
perception of action,

4. his
altered cortical activation in order to choose a selective finger
movement compared with control subjects,

5. the
ways in which he uses, (non-cognitive) motor programs from movement
of the eye or arm to control each other, his use of external Cartesian
space to calibrate his egocentric space in some situations,

6. his
movement accuracy in terms of end point control or a force pulse
technique,

7. the
complexities of gesture he has refined and their possible consequences
for views of the link between gesture and language.

9. the
mechanisms of movement in IW as revealed through PET analysis, showing
possible feedforward activity without feedback as well as top-down
movement control, areas of corollary discharge and the extensive
cerebellar activation required.

3.
The phenomenology of recovery.

IW, still,
after 25 years is improving and refining movements. He is also taking
a pleasure in the mental imposition of movement ideas on his passage
through the world. The methods he uses are unique. Though his condition
is very rare these tricks have important consequences for motor
control in a variety of less rare conditions e.g. sensory loss due
to neuropathy, spinal diseases and stoke. A consideration will be
given for the lessons in rehabilitation that can be taken from his
years of mental concentration on movement. In parallel with this
consideration will be given to the phenomenological con sequences
of sensory loss for his sense of self, and how the limits of having
to think about movement at all times has altered his perception
of the world and of day to day living. It is by a combined approach,
of neuroscientific experiment and phenomenological analysis, that
pictures of IW's world and of the importance of sensory return for
motor control can be built up.

Sources:
The talk will draw on IW's and my account of his recovery in 'Pride
and Daily Marathon.' In addition there will be film of IW shot for
BBC2's Horizon, 'The Man Who Lost His Body,' private video of IW
and another subject with the condition discussing their condition,
with IW giving a master class on how to move without feedback, video
footage and IW and Peter Brook and his cast discussing the theatrical
representation of IW's account which featured in Brook's play, 'The
Man Who.' Video will also be available of IW's recent flight aboard
NASA's KC135 Weightless flight plane with Professor Jim Lackner.
In addition extensive use will be made of the results from research
in a number of labs around the world (see references in the complete
PDF file, forthcoming)

This
workshop will introduce to the phenomenological study of consciousness
as originally developed by the philosopher Edmund Husserl (1859-1938).
Husserl considered his phenomenology to be a "science of consciousness",
to be established with the help of first-person methods. Accordingly,
the main emphasis will be on concretely explicating and practicing
how one does phenomenology; for Husserl was particularly careful
in elaborating methodical tools for the study of consciousness.
Key concepts of the methodology to be discussed are:

Phenomenological
reflection (as distinct from psychological introspection) and the
question of intersubjective control;

Phenomenological
reduction (as distinct from `theoretical reduction`) and the notion
of 'pure' phenomenology;

Descriptive
eidetic analysis of the contents of consciousness, regarding objective
(noematic) as well as subjective (noetic) aspects of content. This
is arguably the center-piece of Husserl's enterprise, and it fits
very well within the overall theme of this year's ASSC Conference.
In elaborating this type of analysis, Husserl has been inspired
by mathematics, proceeding by way of contrasting conscious experiences
of distinctly different content structures (as they obtain in, e.g.,
visually or otherwise perceiving something, in episodic remembering,
in merely imagining something, in picturing something, or in judging
about a state of affairs, etc.) in order to establish those invariant
components that make up the specific content structures of conscious
experiences of one kind or another;

An important
further aspect of Husserl's pre-experimental, philosophical enterprise
to be addressed in the context of this year's Conference concerns
the question whether, and if so, to what extent, a first-person
reflective clarification of content structures of conscious experiences
could serve as a guide for neuroscientifically investigating possible
neural correlates much more specifically than would be possible
without a rigorous phenomenological content analysis preceding the
scientific work. Actually, this aspect of bringing together first-person
phenomenological methods and third-person scientific methods would
seem to be of utmost importance for making progress in the scientific
study of conscious experiences, given that a specification of the
explananda can only help the elaboration of the corresponding explanantia.

Participants
of the workshop should get a good grasp of the first-person phenomenological
methodology, and ideally even discover ways for making good use
of phenomenology in the advancement of the scientific study of consciousness.

Materials
will be provided.

Recommended
literature: 1) Husserl, Edmund. Ideas pertaining to a pure phenomenology
and to a phenomenological philosophy. First book: General introduction
to a pure phenomenology. Translated by F. Kersten. Martinus Nijhoff,
The Hague 1983. Especially Part Three: Methods and problems of pure
phenomenology, chapter three: Noesis and Noema, chapter four: The
set of problems pertaining to noetico-noematic structures.

We propose
to assess physicalist theories of object color, two opposing views
of color experience, and the problems these views raise. The workshop
will be divided into two parts, the first of which will be led by
Zoltán Jakab, the second by Brian McLaughlin.

The first
part will begin by introducing some theories of object color: eliminativism,
dispositionalism, disjunctive physicalism and type physicalism.
We then introduce two opposing views of color experience. Internalism
in this context is the idea that our phenomenal experiences of color
are essentially constructions of our brains that are largely undetermined
by the surface properties that reliably evoke those experiences.
By contrast, phenomenal externalism holds that object colors do
determine the phenomenal character of our experiences of them.

As a
next step, we will examine physicalist theories of object color:
theories according to which colors are causally effective physical
properties of objects. We will present two arguments against type
physicalism. Type physicalism about color implies that object colors
are natural kind essences of some sort: i.e., that there is some
non-disjunctive physical property that all and only red objects
have, and that is causally responsible for our sensations of red
on looking at such objects (mutatis mutandis for other colors).
Unfortunately, given empirical knowledge about object color, it
seems very difficult to maintain that object colors are natural
kind essences of any sort. We will also look at the argument from
individual differences in color phenomenology (in trichromat humans).
According to this argument, since, in the same circumstances of
perception, phenomenal color experiences vary between different
trichromat subjects (due to individual physiological differences),
our color experiences do not have physical correlates in the way
type physicalism requires. However, these arguments do not affect
the plausibility of disjunctive physicalism.

As a
next step, we look at the logical links that obtain between the
above views of object color and color experience. We will argue
that, for phenomenal externalism to be a plausible account of color
experience, type physicalism has to be the correct theory of object
color. Since type physicalism about object color is very likely
false, this latter argument will lead us to endorsing internalism
about color experience. Accepting internalism threatens, in a subtle
way, with the infamous projectivist view of color experience: the
idea that color perception is a grand illusion.

In the
second half of the workshop, McLaughlin will present a theory of
color that attempts to capture what is right about type physicalism
and what is right about projectivism. Physicalists are correct in
holding that colors are physical, environmental properties; however,
as Jakab argues, they are mistaken in claiming that they are natural
natural physical properties. On the evidence, colors are highly
disjunctive physical properties. Consider redness. Redness is disjunctive
physical property, each disjunct of which is a basis for the disposition
to look red to appropriate visual perceivers under appropriate viewing
circumstances. What makes a physical property the property of redness
is the fact that it plays a certain role vis-à-vis vision: namely,
the role of disposing its bearers to look red. Phenomenological
similarity and difference relationships among colors are to be explained
by similarities and differences among visual experiences of them.
Orange is more similar to red than it is to blue not in virtue of
intrinsic aspects of the colors in question, but in virtue of the
fact that what it is like to see orange is more similar to what
it is like to see red than it is to what it is like to see blue.
What is it like to see, e.g., orange, is the phenomenological character
of visual experiences of orange. Given that the phenomenological
characters of color experiences come into the account of what it
is for a physical property to be a certain color (e.g., redness),
this physicalist account of color is incompatible with externalist
intentionalist theories of color experience. We look to opponent
process theory to explain the similarities and differences among
the phenomenological characters of color experiences. The projectivist
is right in claiming that the phenomenal structure of colors is
to be explained by brain processes (in particular, opponent processes),
not by physical properties of surfaces and volumes in the scenes
before our eyes. However, the projectivist is mistaken in claiming
that the surfaces and volumes in such scenes are not really colored.
There are, for instance, surfaces that are red since there are surfaces
that have a property that dispose them to look red to appropriate
viewers in appropriate viewing circumstances. For redness just is
the property that disposes its bearers to look red to appropriate
viewers in appropriate viewing circumstances.

8-
What can functional MRI tell us about the contents of consciousness?
(MORNING)

Geraint
Rees Institute
of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London

The use
of functional MRI (fMRI) as a tool to probe cognition is rapidly
maturing, with convergent methodological standards and increasing
empirical agreement about the biological mechanisms underpinning
Blood Oxygenation Level Dependent (BOLD) contrast. This workshop
will critically consider the use of BOLD contrast fMRI in consciousness
research. The workshop will be divided into two parts. First, a
critical technical overview of the technique will be presented in
an attempt to clarify the nature and scope of the questions that
can, and cannot, be addressed by fMRI experiments. The potential
relationship between fMRI and other physiological techniques used
in neuroscience research will be discussed. The second part of the
workshop will focus more narrowly on considering specific experiments
that have investigated the neural correlates of the contents of
visual awareness. Different types of experimental design will be
reviewed, together with experimental findings from recent investigations
of human visual awareness. Throughout the workshop emphasis will
be placed on understanding both the strengths and potential weaknesses
of fMRI, and how recent work has addressed these issues within the
context of consciousness research. Audience participation, whether
skeptical, curious or enthusiastic, will be encouraged throughout
in a constructive, friendly and informal atmosphere.

9-
Qualia Realism, Presentation, and Representationalism (MORNING)

William
Robinson, Iowa
State University

This
workshop will review main motivating reasons why some philosophers
are attracted to qualia realismand will consider one of the most
important alternatives to it. Since the field is highly controversial,
closure on the issues discussed is not a realistic goal. Instead,
the aim will be to offer a framework in which the relations among
a large number of questions can be clearly seen.

I. Qualia
are often introduced very sketchily, as if everyone knows what one
is committed to in accepting them. Jackson's justly famous knowledge
argument puts the non-physicality of qualia at center stage, and
this feature naturally becomes a focus of debate. But there are
other, more traditional reasons that explain why qualia were introduced
in the first place, and the first part of the workshop will be concerned
with the theoretical work for which qualia have been supposed to
be required. This section will also introduce a distinction between
the phenomenon of presentation (sensory experience presents a world
to us) and representationalism (the thesis that qualia may be dispensed
with in favor of an analysis of sensory experience in terms of representation).

II. The
second section will be devoted to representationalism. Relevant
concepts of representation will be clarified, and the role of representation
in cognitive science will be briefly explored. Advantages of representationalism
will be presented, as will objections from the point of view of
qualia realism. Participants should gain a heightened sense of the
intricacies of representationalism and the questions that arise
with respect to it.

III.
One of the motivations behind representationalism is the thought
that qualia theorists could explain only that we are presented with
qualia, whereas, in fact, we are presented with a world. A key aspect
of the world with which we are presented, whether in vision, audition,
or somatic senses, is its spatial character. Color is seen "on the
objects", even by those who believe that objects are composed of
colorless particles in motion. What is this "out there-ness" of
color, and how might qualia realists account for it? We say that
we see a book in a bookcase and that the bookcase is in the building
we are in when we see the book; but we do not see the book in the
building in the same way that we see it in the bookcase. What is
the difference in the way that location is presented (or, represented)
in these two cases? These and related questions, and their relation
to qualia realism and to the representationalist thesis will be
clarified.

Recent
philosophical discussions of consciousness have put the mind/body
problem back in play. The materialist consensus that had formed
around a mainstream nonreductive materialism has been challenged
from a variety of directions. Some have advocated property dualism,
radical emergence, or a need to fundamentally reconconceptualize
our notion of the physical. Others have criticized the nonreductive
approach as materialism on the cheap and pushed for a strong neuroreductive
theory of consciousness. We will review the recent debates and prospects
for alternative solutions. The workshop aims to provide an overview
of the current options.

This
workshop will focus on current state-of-the-art thinking in affective
neuroscience about the nature of emotion broadly defined and its
connections to consciousness. From there we will try to address
basic questions about the nature of emotional experience (what are
"feelings"). The workshop will contain several basic "modules."

1. The
importance of understanding emotion as foundational and not orthogonal
to consciousness. Emotion is not simply one qualia among many, but
a global state function sitting over homeostasis, and allowing for
primary valuing that interdigitates closely with other global state
functions such as attentional function and executive function, both
of these dependent upon a matrix of biological values, and both
also clearly being essential for consciousness. These interactive
global state functions of emotion, attention, and executive functions
are no less than differential slices of the consciousness pie, and
any neuroscience of consciousness aiming to explain the hard problem
must develop a heuristic theory about these basic abilities, and
their fundamental relatedness.

2. Much
of this fundamental relatedness is probably mediated by various
mesodiencephalic structures, particularly the upper brainstem (midbrain
to pons), which contains most of the basic structures that organize
homeostasis, and that differentially arouse, prime and gate the
thalamocortical forebrain. These brainstem regions generate both
many of the primitives for survival behaviors (supported in the
cranial nerves and brainstem nuclei) and the primitives for attentional
functioning also. As Damasio has pointed out, it is not a coincidence
that the basic foundations for attention, emotion, cortical forebrain
arousal and homeostasis are all in contiguous regions in the upper
brainstem. However, the medulla is probably also contributory to
these fundamental relations between homeostasis, attention, and
emotion, as are the non-specific thalamic systems, the cerebellum,
and the paralimbic cortices. The brainstem is a very complex set
of structures that have been generally dealt with simplistically
in cognitive neuroscience as some sort of homogenous arousal system,
while in reality the whole brainstem is several orders of magnitude
more complex than the cortex, containing roughly 40 nuclei. The
devastation of homeostatic operations in the brainstem is invariably
fatal. The devastation of emotion (the next level of organismic
value in evolutionary terms) doesn t end life, but it does derail
the organization of behavior and virtually all cognitive processing,
as seen in the syndrome of severe forms of akinetic mutism.

3. Problems
associated with a typology of emotion: what are the true "natural
kinds" of primary or prototypical emotion? Why are typologies so
important? What current research problems are confounded by inadequate
typologies? What does animal research say about some of our current
typologies?

4. Current
understanding about the neural architectures for emotion, based
on a typology emphasizing five or six basic prototype states, with
distributed systems that run from paleocortex down into the upper
brainstem (midbrain-pons). Review of three basic clusters of prototype
emotional systems: 1) a non-specific seeking system that operates
as general "gain control" for all the prototype states and is linked
closely to lateral hypothalamic mediation of homeostatic needs,
2) an organismic defense system associated with fear and rage states,
and 3) a social attachment system underpinning emotional bonding,
play, sexuality, nurturance, and separation distress. Monoamines
operate very non-specifically on these (excepting the seeking system
which is heavily DA modulated), while neuropeptides offer much more
affective-behavioral specificity.

5. What
is the difference as well as relationship between emotional processing
in the brain, much of which can be unconscious, and the problem
of "feelings," the manifestation of emotion in consciousness? What
is required to get emotional processing into consciousness? Is there
any evidence that animals can have conscious feelings or just affective
behaviors? Is this question unanswerable in neuroscientific terms
or not?

6. What
is the brain doing when we have a conscious feeling vs. unconscious
emotional processing?? Are there threshold issues here?? Do we need
a certain amount of emotion before it can become conscious?? What
are background emotions and moods? Can strong emotion be unconscious,
or is unconscious strong emotion a contradiction? Distributed neural
systems in the cingulate, insula, other paralimbic regions, and
somatosensory cortices, that may provide "read out" of bodily and
other neurological system activations in the context of primary
emotion, related to the nature of emotional qualia including motor,
somatosensory-visceral dimensions. Fine grained review of recent
neuroimaging of prototype emotional states, questions and implications.
Most crucially, what exactly is going on in the brain that makes
emotions feel good or bad - the mystery of emotional valence ??

7. What
is known about emotion - cognition interactions, at least in general
terms: much of human consciousness once past early infancy consists
of these complex emotion-cognition interactions. Positive emotions
tend to expand cognitive-exploratory spaces, while negative emotions
tend to constrict them, and/or make them obsessive, rigid, or phobic.

The workshop
will review closely major work of Damasio, Panksepp, LeDoux, and
others in affective neuroscience to addresses these fundamental
questions. Reprints of relevant theoretical overview work that I've
published will be distributed on CD, and work of other authors in
this area also (with specific permissions) along with many brain
graphics and slides used in the workshop.

12-
Vision and Consciousness: experimental evidence and its implications
(AFTERNOON)

Arash
Sahraie, Vision
Research Laboratories, Dept of Psychology, University of Aberdeen,
Scotland
Larry Weiskrantz, Department
of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, UK

Conscious
visual experience in normal observers appears to be immediate and
effortless. This conscious experience is degraded or even lost in
entirety in patients with lesions of the visual pathways. In particular,
cortical lesions of the posterior brain result in blindness with
no phenomenal seeing, but nevertheless a number of parallel visual
pathways remain open. The conscious perception of vision in these
patients is replaced by either a vague awareness of a visual event
or no awareness at all. Blindsight refers to the better than chance
discrimination ability in such patients which may be void of any
awareness (blindsight type I) or accompany some awareness of the
visual events (blindsight type II). Given that the lesions are identifiable,
the evidence opens the possibility of contrasting neural correlates
of conscious vs. unconscious visual processing. This workshop will
address the following:

(e) Do
conscious and unconscious processing of vision have identical, overlapping
or separate neuronal implementations?

(f) blindsight
and complex visual stimuli: faces & emotions.

We will
review the literature and outline the current thinking on this topic.
References will be made to the latest findings from the active laboratories
in addressing the above questions. Computer simulations and videos
will be used to demonstrate the paradigms applied in blindsight
research.